News21, a Carnegie Corporation and Knight Foundation-supported investigative project (see below), compiled and analyzed data on voter-fraud reports since 2000. The numbers indicate that voter impersonation “represent[s] one out of about every 15 million prospective voters.”
And although “There is more fraud in absentee ballots and voter registration than any other categories. The analysis shows 491 cases of absentee ballot fraud and 400 cases of registration fraud. A required photo ID at the polls would not have prevented these cases,” News21 analysis shows.
In North Carolina, where a voter-identification bill was passed by the state legislature but vetoed by Gov. Bev Purdue earlier this year, there have been “22 cases of alleged election fraud since 2000. … The most prevalent [type of] fraud was Casting Ineligible Vote at 36 percent (8 cases).”
Here’s the study’s conclusion:
“A News21 analysis of 2,068 alleged election-fraud cases since 2000 shows that while fraud has occurred, the rate is infinitesimal, and in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tough voter ID laws, is virtually non-existent. … With 146 million registered voters in the United States during that time, those 10 cases represent one out of about every 15 million prospective voters. …”
News21 is:
“a national investigative reporting project funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The goal of the program, headquartered at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University, is to produce in-depth, innovative and interactive investigative journalism on issues of national importance.
The voting rights project was produced by 24 students from 11 universities across the country under the direction of journalism professionals. The Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation provided a grant supporting the work of six of the students, and the Hearst Foundations supported another three fellows.”
The Washington Post reported on News21’s findings on Aug. 11:
A new nationwide analysis of more than 2,000 cases of alleged election fraud over the past dozen years shows that in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which has prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tougher voter ID laws, was virtually nonexistent.
The analysis of 2,068 reported fraud cases by News21, a Carnegie-Knight investigative reporting project, found 10 cases of alleged in-person voter impersonation since 2000. With 146 million registered voters in the United States, those represent about one for every 15 million prospective voters. …
People who hate American-style democracy to their core, don’t care about your damn “facts”. If certain demographic groups tend not to vote the ‘right’ way, you need to make it harder for them to vote. The end justifies the means, period.
What? You still believe in the Easter Bunny too?
“Voter ID, which is gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania, done.”
Pennsylvania Republican House Leader Mike Turzai (R-PA)
http://thinkprogress.org/election/2012/06/25/505953/pennsylvania-republican-voter-id-laws-are-gonna-allow-governor-romney-to-win/
North Carolina’s Voter ID bill was co-sponsored by our own Tim Moffitt, BTW…
This has never been a problem anywhere, as study after study has shown. The GOP have to go all out to prevent people from exercising their franchise, along with their attacks on women’s rights, unions, public servants, abortions and any other individual right they get in their cross-hairs. They can’t win on their record, they have no new ideas, but they are passionate about limiting people’s rights. And any false reason will do.
A very strong majority of the American people support voter ID laws.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/08/14/74-of-americans-support-voter-id-laws
The only valid opposition anybody could possibly have to them is that it would prevent voter ID fraud. Who does not have an ID? Every elderly person on SS and Medicare has an ID. Everybody who (legally) drives a vehicle has an ID. Everybody who wants to sit in a tavern and drink a beer has an ID. Tell me who these people are who do not have IDs and are being disenfranchised by such laws?
Additionally, the issue is not a matter of “impersonation”. It is instead the opportunity to defraud the electorate through same day registration requiring no valid ID or evidence of proper citizenship or residency. Voter ID removes those faults and does not disenfranchise a single legitimate voter.
“The only valid opposition anybody could possibly have to them is that it would prevent voter ID fraud.”
There’s a very good reason to oppose voter ID laws: millions of eligible American voters do not have valid photo IDs. But then you know that, as you acknowledge in your next statement:
“Tell me who these people are who do not have IDs and are being disenfranchised by such laws?”
“11 percent of voting-age American citizens
This is pure bull. Every college student has a college ID. Nearly all of them have drivers licenses. Every single one of them who does not have a valid state license can get one free of charge under these laws.
There are no elderly people (practically speaking) who do not have an ID. Both an ID and a SS card are required to receive retirement benefits. The same is true of minorities. Every minority who is driving a vehicle legally has an ID. Every minority receiving any federal benefit already has an ID. Every single minority can get an ID at no charge under these laws.
epic fail on your part.
“epic fail on your part”
So the Brennan Center, the Pennsylvania Dept. of State, and everyone else who attests that millions of eligible voters don’t have ID and will be dis-enfranchised are simply wrong or lying, and Trav is here to lay down the truth.
Thank the Gods.